Suspected killer of 2 Tampa police on trial

Dontae Morris, who is already sentenced to life in prison for a separate murder, is on trial for the deaths of two officers

The Tampa Bay Times

TAMPA — Prosecutors began arguing their case against Dontae Morris Tuesday for the murders of two Tampa policemen, painting Morris as a "vicious, brutal, determined killer" who gunned down the unsuspecting officers during a routine traffic stop in 2010.

In his opening statement, Hillsborough Assistant State Attorney Scott Harmon outlined the many forms of evidence jurors will see and hear, including video and audio recordings of the murders and the statements of a witness who asserts Morris confessed the crime.

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But his first words to the jury were also a paean to the responsibilities undertaken by officers David Curtis and Jeffrey Kocab, who were both shot fatally in the head by the side of 50th Street in Tampa early on a June morning three years ago.

What the officers encountered on that midnight shift, Harmon said, was "what surely must be every law enforcement officer's worst nightmare: a vicious, brutal, determined killer. A killer who was so determined that it wouldn't matter what precautions these officers took."